When I recently read that we are now only 3 steps away from everyone in terms of being connected I must admit that I was sceptical. A handy bit of research to make a good bit of PR I thought.
But then I considered some of the stuff that has happened to me.
I got a new job, quite by chance, with a mobile phone company. The chap I took over from here had just got engaged and there were lots of congratulations messages on his facebook page. One was from his cousin. She looked vaguely familiar.
I did a bit of checking and it turns out that she was the best friend of my best friend's girlfriend at Uni, someone, I had been drinking with many times and last saw in 1997.
At that moment it was like the world stopped spinning, zoomed in on me for a minute, back out to the edge of the solar system and then started up again. I felt simulataneously the smallest yet biggest person in the whole universe, like it was all put together for a reality programme like in The Truman Show.
You might not think that was a great co-incidence. But I've moved 450 miles around this country, had various jobs, made crucial decisions at certain times in my life, yet there was my life falling back into the path of my past without my knowing it. It's all some sort of wibbly-wobbly-timey-wimey thing if you ask me.
How does that work? How do these connections pop up time and again? I rented a room off a chap who went on holiday to Australia, he met a girl, completely at random, in a bar in Melbourne. When they both returned to the UK I met her and it turned out that at her place of work she sat next to a girl I had worked with for about a year some 350 miles away.
That same girl I worked with, years before, had a part time job as one of two barmaids at a college bar in Cheltenham. The same college bar that i always went to when visiting my girlfriend of the time in Cheltenham - she must have served me a drink.
Utterly. Completely. Mad. Brain. Hurt. Need. Lie. Down.
I did some research and, apparantly, this is why 'miracles' are perceived to happen -because there are so many variables, and bits of information being processed (millions a day) that eventually something co-incidental is much more likely to happen than not.
Frankly, it just makes my head hurt. And if you managed to read all of this without it hurting you too, then you're clearly a lot cleverer than me.
Thursday, 14 March 2013
Friday, 1 March 2013
Hello, is that the Chicken Cafe?
How do you get away from people you don't want to speak to? It used to be impossible, as you had to pick a ringing phone as things like caller id didn't exist.
When I was young we used to get phonecalls every night, regular as clockwork with people asking "Is that the Chicken Cafe?". It happened for months. Turned out our number was the same as a place called "The Chicken Cafe" in a nearby town. Same number, different area code.
It got so prevalent we started answering the phone with a cluck and once told a customer we were full because of a big egg conference in the area.
Of course, now mobiles have come along and made it easier by showing you who was phoning. Then it moved on to allowing you to customise the ringtone and picture on your phone, to give you more warning. I actively have pictures of monsters and villains to represent the people I don't want to speak to. If Dracula pops up, I ain't speaking to him (he works in Banking).
So it should be so easy now to avoid speaking to the wrong people. Well, it should. Until your phone tells you that call is from "private number" and human nature takes over.
I know that "private number" more than likely means it's from a place with lots of phones that go through an exchange. But whenever it pops up I'm always intrigued. I think that it might be from someone like the Premium Bonds people, someone headhunting me for an amazing job testing PS3 games for a living or maybe the local curry house offering me a loyalty card.
So, inevitably, I have to pick up. And then I find it's my bank or a telesales call and I'm miffed. I seem to get a lot of people offering me a chance to win a cruise - the most woefully inaccurate piece of marketing I've ever experienced - they might as well be inviting me to my own guillotining.
Why can't it be someone amazing once in a while? A friend of mine works in the media and has become good friends with an icon from my teenage years, so apparantly one day my phone will ring - an unknown number and when I answer I'll be speaking with 90's pop icon Betty Boo.
And you know what. It did. And she was very nice to me, despite the fact I sounded like a mentalist stalker.
Take that Chicken Cafe.
When I was young we used to get phonecalls every night, regular as clockwork with people asking "Is that the Chicken Cafe?". It happened for months. Turned out our number was the same as a place called "The Chicken Cafe" in a nearby town. Same number, different area code.
It got so prevalent we started answering the phone with a cluck and once told a customer we were full because of a big egg conference in the area.
Of course, now mobiles have come along and made it easier by showing you who was phoning. Then it moved on to allowing you to customise the ringtone and picture on your phone, to give you more warning. I actively have pictures of monsters and villains to represent the people I don't want to speak to. If Dracula pops up, I ain't speaking to him (he works in Banking).
So it should be so easy now to avoid speaking to the wrong people. Well, it should. Until your phone tells you that call is from "private number" and human nature takes over.
I know that "private number" more than likely means it's from a place with lots of phones that go through an exchange. But whenever it pops up I'm always intrigued. I think that it might be from someone like the Premium Bonds people, someone headhunting me for an amazing job testing PS3 games for a living or maybe the local curry house offering me a loyalty card.
So, inevitably, I have to pick up. And then I find it's my bank or a telesales call and I'm miffed. I seem to get a lot of people offering me a chance to win a cruise - the most woefully inaccurate piece of marketing I've ever experienced - they might as well be inviting me to my own guillotining.
Why can't it be someone amazing once in a while? A friend of mine works in the media and has become good friends with an icon from my teenage years, so apparantly one day my phone will ring - an unknown number and when I answer I'll be speaking with 90's pop icon Betty Boo.
And you know what. It did. And she was very nice to me, despite the fact I sounded like a mentalist stalker.
Take that Chicken Cafe.
Tuesday, 12 February 2013
Face-ing up to the truth
I don't want to sound like some old (mid-30's) curmudgeon or anything, but it's getting harder and harder to enjoy Facebook. Now, I know that something as trivial as that shouldn't be occupying me, but considering it was Facebook that got me into social media, which led to blogging, which is starting to take off and go places, I thought it worth a rant.
Time was when Facebook felt new and fun. People posted interesting stuff. Ads at a minimum. Spam was just a spiced tin meat. You wanted to be friends with everyone - "Oh look, the chap who used to bully me at school, you know - the one who smashed my head with marbles - he wants to be friends..I really must accept" (completely true, and completely me).
Of course, you do the whole 'Facebook cull' bit where you look through who to keep on your prized list (family, good friends, people who can give you discount on things etc.) but nowadays I've taken - I'll freely admit - to minimising people's posts so I only see 'important' messages, or often not at all. Sometimes, it's the only way I can cut through the noise.
See, the thing is I like a bit of quiet, punctuated with some interesting things. I've got a few chums who rarely post, but when they do it's normally a beautiful photo, or a piece of art they've done, or just a nice joke. I like that, it feels surprising. Hurrah for them.
Of course, I'm acutely aware that I do annoying things. So don't feel afraid to minimise my posts if you don't like links to poorly written blogs, pictures of cats doing humanish things or poor quality puns. Seriously, we don't have enough time in the world as it is, so make a little more by doing away with those things you don't need to know about. Then use the spare 5 minutes a day (35 minutes a week, 30 hours a year) to do something more fun.
Anyway, here're some of the things that happen on Facebook that I really wish wouldn't:
- People publicly telling me they on the toilet. Yep, thanks for that, makes me remember not to shake your hand or touch your phone when I see you.
- People continuing to click on those 'Click likes if you hate cancer' or 'If we get 1million clicks our dad will punch himself in the face'. For the final time, the more you click these, the more the page becomes worth in Facebook terms, the people behind the site sell the page to a marketing firm, and we will all get more spam until the entire front page of Facebook is just adverts for deoderant and dating sites. I especially mean the cancer ones by the way, because I'm yet to meet anyone who actively likes it, so I'll take it as read that we are all pretty much against it. If you're not, let me know.
- Uploading more than 10 photos - Lots of people upload photos, and some of them (obviously not mine) don't have cats in. But the other day someone uploaded 245 photos, and by the time I had got to the 12th at least 5 of them were out of focus and 3 were so similar they could have been used in a 'spot the difference' competition. I couldn't go on, as I'm pretty sure my eyes began to bleed. Pick your best ones and showcase those, go on.
- Using the word 'loose' when you mean 'lose' - Misplaced apostrophes, I can just about handle in the social media world, but this whole loose/lose thing somehow gets to me more than anything else.
- Too many updates in one day - I'd love to see a Facebook where we only get to do one or two things a day, so people would pick and choose what they said. Until then, can't we all self regulate a bit better? Someone did 28 updates the other week. 28? I don't think you can do 28 different things in a day unless you're an octopius with OCD.
- Not ever posting anything. Ever - Sorry, it's like going to a party and you are just standing in the corner staring at us all. Either that or you died and your Facebook account is still going, in which case I apologise.
Anyway, rant over. See you again? I hope so, but it's your choice entirely, because if you've got something better to do with your time than read my old nonsense, then go for it - I really won't hold it against you.
Time was when Facebook felt new and fun. People posted interesting stuff. Ads at a minimum. Spam was just a spiced tin meat. You wanted to be friends with everyone - "Oh look, the chap who used to bully me at school, you know - the one who smashed my head with marbles - he wants to be friends..I really must accept" (completely true, and completely me).
Of course, you do the whole 'Facebook cull' bit where you look through who to keep on your prized list (family, good friends, people who can give you discount on things etc.) but nowadays I've taken - I'll freely admit - to minimising people's posts so I only see 'important' messages, or often not at all. Sometimes, it's the only way I can cut through the noise.
See, the thing is I like a bit of quiet, punctuated with some interesting things. I've got a few chums who rarely post, but when they do it's normally a beautiful photo, or a piece of art they've done, or just a nice joke. I like that, it feels surprising. Hurrah for them.
Of course, I'm acutely aware that I do annoying things. So don't feel afraid to minimise my posts if you don't like links to poorly written blogs, pictures of cats doing humanish things or poor quality puns. Seriously, we don't have enough time in the world as it is, so make a little more by doing away with those things you don't need to know about. Then use the spare 5 minutes a day (35 minutes a week, 30 hours a year) to do something more fun.
Anyway, here're some of the things that happen on Facebook that I really wish wouldn't:
- People publicly telling me they on the toilet. Yep, thanks for that, makes me remember not to shake your hand or touch your phone when I see you.
- People continuing to click on those 'Click likes if you hate cancer' or 'If we get 1million clicks our dad will punch himself in the face'. For the final time, the more you click these, the more the page becomes worth in Facebook terms, the people behind the site sell the page to a marketing firm, and we will all get more spam until the entire front page of Facebook is just adverts for deoderant and dating sites. I especially mean the cancer ones by the way, because I'm yet to meet anyone who actively likes it, so I'll take it as read that we are all pretty much against it. If you're not, let me know.
- Uploading more than 10 photos - Lots of people upload photos, and some of them (obviously not mine) don't have cats in. But the other day someone uploaded 245 photos, and by the time I had got to the 12th at least 5 of them were out of focus and 3 were so similar they could have been used in a 'spot the difference' competition. I couldn't go on, as I'm pretty sure my eyes began to bleed. Pick your best ones and showcase those, go on.
- Using the word 'loose' when you mean 'lose' - Misplaced apostrophes, I can just about handle in the social media world, but this whole loose/lose thing somehow gets to me more than anything else.
- Too many updates in one day - I'd love to see a Facebook where we only get to do one or two things a day, so people would pick and choose what they said. Until then, can't we all self regulate a bit better? Someone did 28 updates the other week. 28? I don't think you can do 28 different things in a day unless you're an octopius with OCD.
- Not ever posting anything. Ever - Sorry, it's like going to a party and you are just standing in the corner staring at us all. Either that or you died and your Facebook account is still going, in which case I apologise.
Anyway, rant over. See you again? I hope so, but it's your choice entirely, because if you've got something better to do with your time than read my old nonsense, then go for it - I really won't hold it against you.
Monday, 14 January 2013
The me on the bus goes blog blog blog
I was on a bus today!
I thought that needed calling out, because I haven't been on a bus in ages. I remember, especially back in the 1990s, I loved buses. You couldn't keep me off them, well, apart from when I got to my destination - it would have been stupid to stay on any longer than that. Yep, it was all great indie music, dreaming of the year 2000 (will we have jetpacs?) and bus travel back then.
Since I made the switch to a car over a decade ago, my daily bus journeys have almost disappeared. But today, due to the weather, I decided to meet the missus at her workplace, so I could make sure she'd get home safely. Ah, how sweet eh? Well, that and I didn't want her wrecking the car, it's insured in my name for god's sake. Anyway, that meant hopping on a local bus.
First up I checked the details on my phone. None of that back in the 1990s, it was all about having the local knowledge, knowing that the number 2 from Broadpark Road, would always appear at between six to seven minutes past the hour. Nowadays the internet told me where, when and how many teeth the bus driver would have (not many, but that's the state of bus drivers in Leeds.) I wandered down to the stop, where my true bus adventure began...
Hailing a bus
I last hailed a bus (signalled for it to stop, not applauded and cheered it for it's recent performances) about 15 years ago. Was it still the same? Do you stick your hand out, slightly raised? Was that something now from the Victorian age, and people would think I was trying to get a Hansom carriage to stop? Maybe the bus would just smash into my arm, mistaking my actions for some sort of gang sign, such are the mean streets these days. Thankfully, it was still the case, and the bus stopped with my hand very much intact. Either that, or I showed the right gang sign.
The cost
As the bus approached, I suddenly thought - have I actually got enough money? Now, I had about £5 in change in my pocket, but no frame of reference on cost. Like stamps, had buses now quadrupled in value? Would my £5 have got me to the end of the road? Did I need the right change? I used to get on the bus and say things like "75p please" and the bus driver would know that I knew the cost of my journey, but that he didn't need to know exactly where I was going - it was an unspoken respect between traveller and service provider. But today? No idea. The answer, rather undramatically, was £2.50.
The driver
Good, they haven't changed. Always a little strange, usually covered in tattoos and with an odd beard. And that was just the lady drivers (I did live in Devon). Anyway, this driver said something quite bizarre. Unsure of what stop I needed, I asked him "What's the best stop for the railway station?" to which he replied "Well, the bus...it goes down from the high street, then it heads down the hill, then it stops on Old Road". Why was he talking in the third person all the time, saying 'It' when referring to his bus? Surely he was in charge, but the way he talked sounded like the bus just went on its own and he was just a helpless passenger, only sitting right at the front. Maybe this was what buses were like now, sentient beings? No, it just turned out he had a strange turn of phrase. Shame. I thought it might have been something from the future we were all promised when we were young, and that it would have hovered as well.
The facilities
Buses were buses back then. Seats, the driver, windows, that was it really, and wheels of course (nearly forgot them). Nowadays it's like Minority Report. Flashing screens, priority seating for the elderly, fold up seats to store buggies, a mini bar, a robot butler, yep things have changed. What hasn't though is that great sign behind the driver that says "Do not distract the driver's attention and do not stand forward of this sign." Lovely, you can't improve on a classic like that, can you? And it still had wheels too (that song doesn't lie.)
The memories
Anyway, as I whiled away the 25 minutes on the bus, I remembered some of my favourite bus moments. The school bus, where people would get on, hand the return ticket out the window to a friend - who would then get on and show the same ticket. I'm pretty sure we bankrupted a few local bus firms in Devon. Or the rather bizarre phrase, that people sitting at the back of the bus would declare, stating "Back seat boys, make all the noise." Never really got to the bottom of that. And, as we pulled away from another bus stop, I remembered the time that having enjoyed a lunchtime pizza buffet with a girl, and waiting for a bus to arrive, I accidentally hugged her a little too tightly causing her to heimlich her entire lunch back up and onto the wall of the bus stop. Oh yeah, I was quite the smooth operator.
Anyway, I got to my destination and met up with the missus. She was delighted to see me (I didn't cause her to vomit, so I've clearly moved on since then) and she was even more impressed that I had got on a bus. So was I, I thought, I must write a blog about that I said.
So I did. And you just read it.
I thought that needed calling out, because I haven't been on a bus in ages. I remember, especially back in the 1990s, I loved buses. You couldn't keep me off them, well, apart from when I got to my destination - it would have been stupid to stay on any longer than that. Yep, it was all great indie music, dreaming of the year 2000 (will we have jetpacs?) and bus travel back then.
Since I made the switch to a car over a decade ago, my daily bus journeys have almost disappeared. But today, due to the weather, I decided to meet the missus at her workplace, so I could make sure she'd get home safely. Ah, how sweet eh? Well, that and I didn't want her wrecking the car, it's insured in my name for god's sake. Anyway, that meant hopping on a local bus.
First up I checked the details on my phone. None of that back in the 1990s, it was all about having the local knowledge, knowing that the number 2 from Broadpark Road, would always appear at between six to seven minutes past the hour. Nowadays the internet told me where, when and how many teeth the bus driver would have (not many, but that's the state of bus drivers in Leeds.) I wandered down to the stop, where my true bus adventure began...
I last hailed a bus (signalled for it to stop, not applauded and cheered it for it's recent performances) about 15 years ago. Was it still the same? Do you stick your hand out, slightly raised? Was that something now from the Victorian age, and people would think I was trying to get a Hansom carriage to stop? Maybe the bus would just smash into my arm, mistaking my actions for some sort of gang sign, such are the mean streets these days. Thankfully, it was still the case, and the bus stopped with my hand very much intact. Either that, or I showed the right gang sign.
The cost
As the bus approached, I suddenly thought - have I actually got enough money? Now, I had about £5 in change in my pocket, but no frame of reference on cost. Like stamps, had buses now quadrupled in value? Would my £5 have got me to the end of the road? Did I need the right change? I used to get on the bus and say things like "75p please" and the bus driver would know that I knew the cost of my journey, but that he didn't need to know exactly where I was going - it was an unspoken respect between traveller and service provider. But today? No idea. The answer, rather undramatically, was £2.50.
The driver
Good, they haven't changed. Always a little strange, usually covered in tattoos and with an odd beard. And that was just the lady drivers (I did live in Devon). Anyway, this driver said something quite bizarre. Unsure of what stop I needed, I asked him "What's the best stop for the railway station?" to which he replied "Well, the bus...it goes down from the high street, then it heads down the hill, then it stops on Old Road". Why was he talking in the third person all the time, saying 'It' when referring to his bus? Surely he was in charge, but the way he talked sounded like the bus just went on its own and he was just a helpless passenger, only sitting right at the front. Maybe this was what buses were like now, sentient beings? No, it just turned out he had a strange turn of phrase. Shame. I thought it might have been something from the future we were all promised when we were young, and that it would have hovered as well.
The facilities
Buses were buses back then. Seats, the driver, windows, that was it really, and wheels of course (nearly forgot them). Nowadays it's like Minority Report. Flashing screens, priority seating for the elderly, fold up seats to store buggies, a mini bar, a robot butler, yep things have changed. What hasn't though is that great sign behind the driver that says "Do not distract the driver's attention and do not stand forward of this sign." Lovely, you can't improve on a classic like that, can you? And it still had wheels too (that song doesn't lie.)
The memories
Anyway, as I whiled away the 25 minutes on the bus, I remembered some of my favourite bus moments. The school bus, where people would get on, hand the return ticket out the window to a friend - who would then get on and show the same ticket. I'm pretty sure we bankrupted a few local bus firms in Devon. Or the rather bizarre phrase, that people sitting at the back of the bus would declare, stating "Back seat boys, make all the noise." Never really got to the bottom of that. And, as we pulled away from another bus stop, I remembered the time that having enjoyed a lunchtime pizza buffet with a girl, and waiting for a bus to arrive, I accidentally hugged her a little too tightly causing her to heimlich her entire lunch back up and onto the wall of the bus stop. Oh yeah, I was quite the smooth operator.
Anyway, I got to my destination and met up with the missus. She was delighted to see me (I didn't cause her to vomit, so I've clearly moved on since then) and she was even more impressed that I had got on a bus. So was I, I thought, I must write a blog about that I said.
So I did. And you just read it.
Tuesday, 11 December 2012
Three things I noticed at lunch today
I had lunch today. Blimey, that's a thrilling start to a blog isn't it? Never mind your "Call me Ishmael" or "The sweat was lashing off of Sick Boy" nope, "I had lunch today" is the way to go.
I only bring it up, the point - not the lunch, because I rarely get away from my desk for lunchtime. I've taken to bringing in crackers and cheese recently and reading the internet, so I don't tend to walk round the office building. Today I did, and thank goodness for that, because three different things happened that I could then tell you about (beckons the reader closer with hand in comedy 'let me share a secret' mime).
1. Men. This is a fact. If you use your mobile phone while standing at a urinal, you just look like you are trying to take a picture of your own penis. Fact. Businessman in suit today, happily 'multi-tasking' next to me, just looks like a perv. I'm not the perv, by the way - in case it looks like that.
2. Women. Get your purse ready. Queing to buy a newspaper, so I could have something to read at lunchtime, the woman in front took about 60 seconds to get the 47p she needed to pay for the transaction.
3.Everyone. Doesn't matter who you are, you cannot fail to be intrigued by one of the greatest statements I've ever heard. Passing people having a clearly very important meeting, one chap said - with the straightest of all faces, and with utter seriousness - "In this climate, sausages are more important than ever." Single-handledly the funniest and most intriguging thing I've heard in ages. Financial climate? Cold climate? Why are they so important? What are they NOT telling us about sausages, that makes them so darned crucial. I expect a full ITV1 expose before the week is out. Either that or a lovely hot-dog.
Anyway, that was my lunchtime, thank you random people I saw - you were delicious.
I only bring it up, the point - not the lunch, because I rarely get away from my desk for lunchtime. I've taken to bringing in crackers and cheese recently and reading the internet, so I don't tend to walk round the office building. Today I did, and thank goodness for that, because three different things happened that I could then tell you about (beckons the reader closer with hand in comedy 'let me share a secret' mime).
1. Men. This is a fact. If you use your mobile phone while standing at a urinal, you just look like you are trying to take a picture of your own penis. Fact. Businessman in suit today, happily 'multi-tasking' next to me, just looks like a perv. I'm not the perv, by the way - in case it looks like that.
I'm sure it's very innocent, but doing what you do also implies that you only need one hand to - as it were - steady the ship. If there were women in the toilet, you wouldn't be impressing them. Actually, if there were women in the toilet, you're probably in the wrong toilet.
2. Women. Get your purse ready. Queing to buy a newspaper, so I could have something to read at lunchtime, the woman in front took about 60 seconds to get the 47p she needed to pay for the transaction.
Now, I know purses/wallets can be a bit tricky, but it was the fact the woman had to wait to be told how much her purchase was, before she then decided to get her purse out of the bag, opened, coins rattled through and selected, before she actually paid. To be honest, most shops to tend to expect you to pay at the end, so don't appear to be surprised - as if they would chalk it up on a tab for you. Bartering for goods, using livestock as capital, isn't the done thing anymore.
3.Everyone. Doesn't matter who you are, you cannot fail to be intrigued by one of the greatest statements I've ever heard. Passing people having a clearly very important meeting, one chap said - with the straightest of all faces, and with utter seriousness - "In this climate, sausages are more important than ever." Single-handledly the funniest and most intriguging thing I've heard in ages. Financial climate? Cold climate? Why are they so important? What are they NOT telling us about sausages, that makes them so darned crucial. I expect a full ITV1 expose before the week is out. Either that or a lovely hot-dog.Anyway, that was my lunchtime, thank you random people I saw - you were delicious.
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